The ICO Congresses are organized every three years. The Congress consists of the General Business Meeting as requested by the ICO statutes and of a Scientific Conference that should cover the wide disciplinary field of optics in its entirety. The purpose of this letter is to solicit bids for organizing the 20th ICO Congress to be held in 2005. Usually the Congresses are organized in August or in early September.

While the ICO aims that the Congresses would be alternate between the various parts of the world, highly qualified proposals from all areas are encouraged and all bids will be considered. The 19th ICO Congress will be held in August 2002 in Florence, Italy, whereas the 1999 Congress (ICO-18) was in San Francisco, CA and in 1996 (ICO-17) and 1993 (ICO-16) the Congresses were in Taejon, Korea and in Budapest, Hungary, respectively.

Applicants preparing their bids are referred to the Information and Questionnaire Form on ICO Congresses and other major ICO events, that can be found also in the Green Book "Towards ICO-18" on pages 80-85, or in the ICO home pages. Please submit your bid by completing the Questionnaire Form, including the necessary enclosures, and send it to me electronically or by airmail by 31 December 2000 for the consideration of the Bureau.

The 2000 ICO Prize has been awarded to Stefan Hell of the Max-Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry at Göttingen, Germany for his innovative contributions to the field microscopy and their applications in the biological sciences. The next issue of this Newsletter will provide more detail.

As usual, the calls for applications for the « ICO Prize » and the ICO Galileo Galilei Award are issued with this October issue of the Newsletter with a deadline of March 15 of next year. For the third award involving ICO, the ICO/ICTP award for young scientists from the third world, the call for application was issued in the July 2000 issue with an October 1st deadline. The present issue of the ICO Newsletter therefore combines the two calls for applications for the "ICO Prize" and for the "Galileo Galilei Award" for 2001. It is appropriate to reproduce here the rules applicable and point out to the sharp distinction that exists between the two awards. The January 2001 issue of this Newsletter will have more about the 2000 award winners.

Rules applicable to the ICO Prize :

Sketch of the original coin for the Ernst Abbe medal, donated by the Carl Zeiss foundation.

ICO has established in 1982 the ICO Prize, to be given each year to an individual who has made a noteworthy contribution to optics, published or submitted for publication before he or she has reached the age of 40. (Specifically, the Prize winner must not have reached the age of 40 before December 31 of the year for which the Prize is awarded). The character of the work of successive Prize recipients should preferably alternate between predominantly experimental or technological and predominantly theoretical. The "noteworthy" contribution in optics is measured chiefly by its impact (past or possibly future) on the field of optics generally, opening a new subfield or significantly expanding an established subfield in research or technology.

The Prize includes :

· a citation,

· a cash award of an amount established in the triennial budget of the ICO,

· and the invitation to present an invited paper and receive the award at the next ICO Congress or another ICO meeting mutually agreed to by the bureau and the award winner.

Every year, the ICO Prize Committee issues a call for nominations that is published in the ICO Newsletter, receives the nominations and selects the recipients for approval by the Bureau at its next meeting. The award needs not be made each year if the Prize Committee so chooses. The Prize is preferably given to an individual, but it can be shared by two persons. Eligibility for the Prize is not excluded by previous prizes awarded to the individual. The selected Prize winner is then announced in the ICO Newsletter and, as appropriate, in one or more optics journals. The prize will be presented at the next appropriate major ICO meeting and the Prize winner will be expected to deliver an invited talk at that Meeting.

Additional general information about the ICO Prize :

The cash award presently carries an amount of US$1000. In addition to the rules adopted by ICO, the Carl Zeiss foundation has generously agreed to donate an Ernst Abbe medal to the winner.

The last ten winners of the Prize are :

1991 David A.B. Miller, U.K and USA.

1992 Wolfgang Peter Schleich, Germany

1993 Aleksander K. Rebane, Estonia

1994 Emmanuel Desurvire, France and USA

1995 Tony F. Heinz, USA

1996 Vladimir Buzek, Slovakia

1997 Andrew M. Weiner, USA

1998 David Mendlovic, Israel, and Haldun Ozaktas, Turkey

1999 Hugo Thienpont, Belgium

2000 Stefan Hell, Germany

The ICO Prize Committee, chaired by Prof. R. Dändliker and comprizing Profs. H.H. Arsenault, K. Chalasinska-Macukow, A. Consortini and G.C. Righini, is now seeking nominations for the 2001 Prize. Nominators are asked to follow the instructions given below. Nominations should be sent by March 15, 2001 to Prof. R. Dändliker, Chair of the Committee, Institute of Microtechnology, University of Neuchâtel rue A.L. Bréguet 2, CH 2000 NEUCHATEL, Switzerland, fax +41 32 718 3201, e-mail rene.dandliker@imt.unine.ch.

Rules applicable to the Galileo Galilei Award :

1 - The Galileo Galilei medal of ICO is awarded for outstanding contributions to the field of optics which are achieved under comparatively unfavorable circumstances.

2.1 - The outstanding contributions in the field of optics should refer to :

- fundamental scientific questions or problems, or

- research or development of optical methods or devices, or

- scientific or technical leadership in the establishment of regional optical centers.

2.2 - "Comparatively unfavorable circumstances" refers to difficult economic or social conditions or lack of access to scientific or technical facilities or sources of information.

2.3 - The outstanding contributions must be documented, if applicable, by internationally acknowledged publications. Exceptionally, reports can be considered, provided that they are made available to the Award Committee.

3 - The award is normally given to one person. Exceptionally, however, if a collective contribution is judged to be worthy of the award a team of several persons may be selected.

4 - Every year, the ICO Committee for the Regional Development of Optics issues a call for nominations that is published in the ICO Newsletter, receives the nominations and selects the winner for approval by the Bureau at its next meeting. The award need not be given every year if the Bureau so chooses.

5 - The award consists of :

a) the Galileo Galilei Medal,

b) assistance in travel to present an invited paper and receive the award at the next ICO Congress or another ICO meeting mutually agreed to by the Bureau and the award winner,

c) special attention and appropriate measures of ICO to support the future activities of the award winner.

Additional general information about the Galileo Galilei Award :

The Italian Society of Optics and Photonics, SIOF (Società Italiana di Ottica e Fotonica) has agreed to support ICO's initiative and donate the silver medal with the portrait of Galileo Galilei to be given to the recipient.

The Award contributes to one of the essential missions of the International Commission for Optics : recognize the promotion of Optics under difficult circumstances. The award was established by the 1993 General Assembly of ICO and has be awarded annually since 1994. The previous winners are

1994 Ion Mihailescu, Romania

1995 Rajpal Singh Sirohi, India

1996 Daniel Malacara, Mexico

1997 Natalyia D. Kundikova, Russia

1998 Ajoy K. Ghatak, India

1999 Mario Garavaglia, Argentina.

The award for 2000 has not been announced yet.

The prize will be presented at the next appropriate major ICO meeting and the Prize winner will be expected to deliver an invited talk at that Meeting. Applications should follow the instructions below and nominators are encouraged to clearly documents all aspects of the nomination, including

the characterisation of the scientific work,

the activities in management and organisation in the applicant's homeland,

the cooperation with and support of organisations outside the homeland,

the nature of the organisation that the candidate is working for in his/her homeland,

the characterisation of the "unfavourable circumstances" under which the work was performed.

Nominators are encouraged to generate supporting letters; each supporting letter must come from a different country or ICO Territory and bring an additional information on the case. The number of supporting letters will not be a selection criterion.

The recipient will be expected to give a presentation based upon his/her achievements at the next appropriate ICO Meeting.